starting a new year

Happy New Year to anyone out there listening.

3.1.2011 BUILDING NEWS

The weather is definitely drying up here even if Queensland is still flooded. Edd has been out with the plans measuring up the house site and trying to get building started.

He thinks the first thing to do is to get Mick here to increase the size of the hole the house fits into and prepare the site a bit better. We also need to move the swales back a bit and fix some drainage channels at the other side of the house site where a sort of creek is trying to form.

Edd has also started to phone up our various trade’s men and make sure they are organised. Our friend Peter has offered to do some special coloured laminated glass if we would like it. He is learning a new technique where colour is laminated in like works of art by a something like screen-printing. Well, that is what I think he was saying.

OTHER NEWS

We have had a very enjoyable holiday period and met up with lots of good friends. Marg and Allan, from Alice Springs, came for lunch one day and Peter and Thea stayed here to celebrate New Year. It was very hot that night but there were so many insects that the beads on the donga door could not cope so we had to shut it. Edd and I had a very uncomfortable night but our friends slept in the loft of Edd’s shed and said it was not too bad there. Peter had the good sense to turn off all the lights as soon as possible, which probably helped.

Bo has had a very busy time in her restaurant and Josh has been working in the kitchens washing dishes and doing food prep, so we have not seen much of them. I took Morren to the sailing club on Sunday and the commodore, Greg, really looked after him. I thought it might be too windy for Morren to sail but he took out one of the little boats and managed quite well. Greg let him drive the rescue launch at high speed, which he adored. Ollie has gone off with a friend to holiday camp so the two boys are having some time apart to ease sibling rivalry.

Mostly I hang out in the garden. Today, I harvested some garlic, runner beans, a cabbage, and kiffler potatoes. I planted out a chilli plant and did more weeding. Watering has become a feature of life again. The goat kids are now in their newly fenced croft and we have put on their collars, with their names on. This year we have gold collars and green name tags. Luckily my notes were pretty good this year and sorting out who was who was simple.

With all the rain we have delayed getting in hay and having the sheep shorn so now we have to organise all that too. That means cleaning out a space in the shed for the hay and arranging somewhere to put the sheep ready for shearing. There is still more fencing that has to be done because we need to complete the fencing round the hill so the horses can go back there again. No time for relaxing yet!